The employees in Wells Fargo's so-called wholesale unit, which is separate from its retail bank, added or altered information without customers' knowledge, the Journal reported on.wsj.com/2GrYFvd.

The information added varied from social security numbers to addresses to dates of birth for people associated with business-banking clients, the WSJ reported.

The incident happened in 2017 and early 2018 as Wells Fargo was trying to meet a deadline to comply with a regulatory consent order related to the bank’s anti-money-laundering controls, the report said.

Wells Fargo became aware of the behaviour in recent months from employees, according to the Journal.

The bank has reported the problem to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the agency is probing the problem, the WSJ said, citing a person familiar with the matter.

The bank, smarting from a prolonged sales scandal in its retail banking business, is still leading to probes by regulators.